Mirror, Mirror
by Lady Nightwisp
Summary: Young Bellatrix recieves a very special gift from Sirius and Regulus on her birthday. Part 4 of the Once Upon a Time series. Oneshot


Disclaimer: Whoever told you I was J.K. Rowling should probably get their sight checked.

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><p>Bellatrix really should have known better than to accept a present from Regulus. She knew that behind that adorable smile was a mind just as devious as his brother's. She knew it. But every time he was around, he had a way of entrancing her, making her forget how devilish she knew he was. And that was how she had ended up with this cursed mirror on her wall.<p>

She knew she should have run when he came into her room, carrying a package even bigger than he was. But he had just offered her an innocent smile and she had been transfixed. It couldn't be that bad, she had reasoned. She had been wrong.

It had all started yesterday, on her birthday, while she was getting ready for her party…

XXXXX

"Bella! Bella!" Regulus called in delight.

He ran into her room, carrying a large, brightly wrapped present.

"Hello, Regulus," she said, smiling in spite of the warning bells going off in the back of her head.

It couldn't be that bad. After all, Sirius wasn't anywhere in sight. And, anyway, not all their pranks were bad. For Narcissa's birthday, they had transfigured Lucius Malfoy into a frog and given him to her. That had been sweet, if a bit risky. Bellatrix herself had helped with that one. And it was her birthday today. Surely they had a nice prank planned. Regulus looked so proud of himself.

"We have a present for you!" Regulus told her.

"Is it from you and Sirius?" Bella asked.

He nodded eagerly.

"Open it right now!" he begged.

"Well, alright," she agreed.

She took the large package from Regulus. It was very heavy. She quickly tore off the paper and found a large mirror in a round frame decorated with silver vines and flowers.

"It's beautiful," she gasped.

Regulus grinned madly. The warning bells grew slightly louder.

"Put it on your wall!" he begged. "I want to see it!"

Bella found that she couldn't refuse those adorable puppy eyes, no matter what her brain was trying to tell her.

"Where shall we put it?" she asked.

Regulus pointed at a blank space above her bed.

"There!" he decided.

"Okay," Bella agreed.

She picked up her wand from her dresser and lifted the mirror to the place Regulus had pointed. Unfortunately, she didn't know any way to hold it in place with magic.

"Here, use this," Regulus handed her a piece of paper. "It's a sticking charm."

Bella looked at the spell.

"Firmam retineamus," she chanted.

She realized that she probably shouldn't have done that when Regulus started giggling. He shoved a second piece of paper in her hand and ran out of the room. Those alarm bells were definitely ringing very loudly right now. She had a very bad feeling about this.

She looked down at the piece of paper in her hand.

"Ask the mirror a question in rhyme," it read.

Bella looked at the paper, then at the mirror. An idea began to formulate in her mind.

"Mirror, mirror, without a crack, tell me who's the prettiest Black," she chanted.

"Sirius," a voice declared.

She looked around, but no one was in the room. Unless…

"Yes, the mirror is talking," the voice said.

"Did you just say Sirius was the prettiest Black?" she asked.

"Ahem, rhyme," the mirror reminded her.

"Mirror, Mirror, without a crack, did you say Sirius is the prettiest Black?"

"Couldn't you be a little more creative with your questions?" the mirror requested.

"Just answer the question," Bella ordered.

"Yes, I did say Sirius is the prettiest Black," the mirror told her. "And it is physically impossible for me to lie."

"But what about Cissy, and me?"

Silence.

"Mirror, mirror, in silver fixed, what about Cissy and Bellatrix?" she rephrased her question.

"Narcissa is third and you are fifth," the mirror explained.

"Who's second and- I mean; Mirror, mirror, let your knowledge come forth, who is second and who is fourth?"

"Regulus is second and Andromeda is fourth," the mirror replied.

A suspicion began to take root in her mind.

"Mirror, Mirror, never to rust, did Sirius and Regulus enchant you thus?" she asked.

"Do you know how vague that question is?" the mirror whined. "Be more specific."

"Mirror, mirror, before your light dims, by what power do you answer my questions?"

"I'm a magic mirror. Some wizard put a spell on me, a few hundred years ago. It was some complicated rite involving spleen of toad and toe of goat, or something," it told her. "And what's that supposed to mean: before your light dims?"

"This!" Bellatrix declared with a wicked grin.

She tossed a heavy iron trinket at the mirror's polished surface. She expected the glass to shatter instantly. Instead, her trinket stopped as if it had run into a wall and fell to her bed.

"Oh, come on," she whined.

"Please don't do that again," the mirror requested. "I'm not fond of iron objects flying at my head."

"Mirror, mirror, with tongue too rough, tell me how to shut you up," Bella said.

"You can't," the mirror replied with what she knew would have been a malicious grin had it had a face.

"Then I'll move you out of my room," she decided, raising her wand to remove the sticking charm.

"It's a permanent sticking charm," the mirror told her. "I'm not coming off."

"Mirror, mirror, shine and gleam, whose idea was it to give you to me?" she asked angrily.

"The mirror was Walburga's idea, the magic mirror was Regulus' idea," the mirror explained.

Bella swore. But whatever. She could still blame Sirius.

She ran out of the room, down to the parlor where the party guests were waiting for her.

"Sirius Black!" she screamed.

He looked up from where he was standing beside his parents. Regulus stood beside him. Both brothers were grinning madly.

She ran up to them and punched Sirius in the face. He reeled.

"What was that for?" he asked.

"For being prettier than me!" she told him.

He looked at Regulus and the two burst out laughing uncontrollably.

"I told you she'd ask!" Regulus declared.

"Good call!" Sirius replied, between bouts of laughter.

"I have to go!" Bella announced.

She ran back to her room.

"Back so soon?" the mirror asked.

"Mirror, mirror, without a crack, who's the prettiest in the house of Black?"

"It's still Sirius," the mirror told her. "Did you really expect it to change in one minute?"

"But, I gave him a black eye," Bella told it. "He's not pretty anymore."

"According to rule 13, paragraph 5, subsection A, footnote 26 of my rulebook, minor injuries which will heal without scarring within a year don't affect prettiness. Sorry, missy."

"Argh!"

XXXX

It became a habit for Bellatrix to ask the mirror every morning: Mirror, Mirror, without a crack, who's the prettiest in the house of Black. As the years passed, Bellatrix thought she would move higher on the list of the prettiest Blacks. Instead, the opposite happened. She was sure that Sirius would lose his privileged place at the top of the list when he was burned off the tapestry. Not so. Apparently, the mirror ignored family squabbles and went only by blood. Narcissa married Lucius Malfoy, and he overtook third place, pushing Bella down to sixth. Andromeda's marriage to Ted Tonks put him in sixth, pushing her to seventh. The birth of Nymphadora pushed her to eighth. When Regulus died, she regained her old place at seventh, but it was a small victory, and soon lost when Draco Malfoy was born.

And throughout everything, Sirius stayed on in the number one spot. Bellatrix became obsessed with knocking him out of it, no matter what. When she was thrown into Azkaban, she lost access to the mirror. It drove her insane. She wanted nothing more than to know where Sirius stood on the list. He was in Azkaban, too. It couldn't be helping his appearance. But when she finally escaped and got back to her mirror, it still claimed he was the prettiest. That night, she tried every curse imaginable on it. Nothing hit it.

XXXXX

Then, finally, she killed him. She killed Sirius.

"Mirror, Mirror, without a crack, who's the prettiest in the house of Black?" she asked, with a wicked grin.

"I've told you a million times," the mirror whined. "Sirius."

"He's dead," she insisted.

"Are you sure?" the mirror asked.

"I saw him fall," she said.

But now she was uncertain. Could she have been wrong about that curtain?

"For death to count, the soul must move to the other side," the mirror remarked cryptically.

"What do you mean?" Bellatrix asked.

"In rhyme," the mirror reminded her.

"Mirror, mirror, bright and clean, tell me what on Earth you mean," she chanted.

"Can I show you?" the mirror requested.

"I suppose," she agreed.

The surface of the mirror began to fog up. Bella leaned closer, curious. It had never done this before. A shadow appeared in the mist, resolving into two shapes, which gradually came into focus. When she recognized them, Bellatrix jumped back in shock.

"Sirius! Regulus!"

The brothers, looking no older than the day they had on her twelfth birthday, grinned at her from the depths of the mirror.

"I don't understand," Bellatrix whispered.

"When I fell through the curtain, I was left the land of the living, but I didn't die," Sirius told her. "I was just kind of there. Everywhere and nowhere. Very disconcerting feeling. Trust me. So, anyway, there I was, floating along in this timeless void, when suddenly, this little portal pops open. I just had to investigate, and it turned out there was some wizard in the fifteenth century trying to bind a human soul to a mirror to make a talking mirror. I recognized the mirror, and the opportunity was simply too good to pass up, so I let him bind me. Then, a few hundred years later, little me went shopping for a magic mirror and voila! Stable time loop."

"Why's Regulus there?" Bellatrix asked.

"I got killed by inferni," Regulus explained. "It caused enough of a disruption for Sirius to nab my soul before it moved on."

"Don't you hate being stuck in a mirror for eternity?" Bellatrix asked.

"Nope!" both brothers declared.

"It's fun," Sirius explained.

"And we have each other," Regulus added.

"And one more thing," Bellatrix began. "Why do you both look like kids?"

"We can change, if you like," Sirius offered.

In a flash, both were teenagers. Sirius tall and devilishly handsome, Regulus smaller and slighter, but still undeniably good looking.

"I think I liked the kids better," she admitted.

She had too many bad memories associated with teenaged Sirius and Regulus.

Instantly, they were kids again.

"So now you know," Sirius said. "I'll always be the prettiest Black. And there's nothing you can do about it."

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><p>Author's note: Well, that was… odd. I'm not quite sure what happened with the last half of the story. It just happened. I can't decide if I like it or not. It's kind of weird, but, on the other hand, I rather like the idea of Sirius and Regulus hanging out in the mirror together. What you guys think? Too weird? Not weird enough?<p> 


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